Saturday, September 29, 2012

Rape Hysteria by Students, Part 1 / Misandry in Education

It’s
going to take a while to come close to describing the extent of the rape
hysteria in education, and how it often translates into a form of misandry –
sexism against men and boys – and often leads to a presumption of guilt against
men and boys who are wrongly accused of rape. Since this is a very
controversial issue and we’ll be dealing with a lot of information, I’d like to
list some core values upfront that I hope we can all agree on:

1.
There exists in the world both victims of rape and victims of wrongful
accusations of rape, and both deserve our compassion and support. To that end,
there is a balance to be maintained between the rights and dignity of accusers
and the rights and dignity of the accused. The presumption that accusers by
default are liars, or that the accused by default are guilty, is a form of
prejudice (prejudice meaning pre-judging)
that ultimately harms both sexes.

2.
Men and women have the right to advocate for victims of rape and victims of wrongful
rape accusations. It is not sexist to say that some women lie about rape any
more than it is sexist to say that some men rape. What is sexist is the idea
that we should exclude and silence an entire class of victims from the
discourse on gender equity.

3.
Most men do not rape. Most women do not lie about rape. What this means is that
generalizing about rape as part of “male culture” or “normative masculinity,”
or about rape lies as a part of “female culture” or “normative femininity,” or
any other phrase used to tar either sex with a broad brush, is not only not constructive,
but also veers very closely to hate speech. That does not mean that both rape
and false accusations of rape are not problems; they are problems. What it
means is that such behavior is not the norm for either sex, and we need to work
toward respecting each other by remembering that.

I
think this is a fairly reasonable and balanced set of values. And starting from
those values and discovering and owning up to where we stray from them will be
the litmus test in addressing the phenomenon of misandry against men and boys
in education. In every case of misandry, simply reverse the sexes and ask
yourself if it would be acceptable. And if we cannot say that such a role
reversal is morally justified, then something in academia needs to change.

It
is my belief that the indifference and hostility in education toward men and
boys wrongly accused of sexual misconduct started out as a genuine concern for
victims of sexual assault. But somewhere along the way that compassion and
advocacy for women transformed into a zero-sum game that divided men and women
into separate and antagonistic sides, where those who came to dominate the
discourse insisted that one “side” alone should prevail, and where advocacy for
victims of rape too often came to include silencing an entire class of victims:
those who are wrongly accused. Critics of those who advocate equality for men
and boys often falsely characterize them as wanting to turn back the clock. On
the contrary; we do not need to do away entirely with advocacy for women. What
we need to do is keep a lot of what we have while progressing beyond some of
the unhelpful and quite frankly sexist ways we go about it.

Given the stigma and
ostracism that often afflicts those wrongly accused, and the persistence with
which it will follow them (especially in the internet age), false and mistaken
accusations of sexual assault have the power to destroy their means of
educating themselves, making a living, creating loving and committed
relationships, and becoming successful and productive members of society. Men
and boys who are wrongly accused of sexual assault are spit upon, they are
harassed and intimidated with threats of violence or death; some are chased,
some are killed, and others kill themselves. In short, wrongful accusations
have the power to ruin not only individual lives, but fracture communities.
Therefore, it is something we need to take seriously. If you wish to learn more about victims of wrongful accusations of sexual
misconduct, please visit the Community of the Wrongly Accused, the world’s
largest blog giving a voice to victims of wrongful accusations.

The
real problem with rape hysteria is not the hyper-awareness of the incidence of
rape; it is the presumption of guilt against the person accused and the
destruction of their due process rights that often come with it. For this video
on rape hysteria by students, we’ll be focusing on what I believe to be, by
comparison, more moderate forms of misandry, and while I believe that some of what
we will discuss here, depending on your perspective, just slightly crosses the
border into misandry, I believe it’s important to discuss it, because when we
start talking more about faculty and administrators, we will see where the
students are getting some of their ideas.

Anarticle in the Baltimore Sun tells us, YOU ARE ACCUSED of a shameful crime. Your accuser is unnamed. The
time, place and circumstances of your crime are unspecified. No evidence is
presented. You are condemned.

This isn't Kafka. At
Brown University, a very liberal liberal-arts school in Rhode Island, a ''rape
list'' scrawled on the wall of a library women's room names ''men who have
sexually assaulted me or a woman I know.''

The
list,
started in October, names 30 men. As soon as janitors scrub the wall clean,
someone writes the ''rape list'' on it again.

Lisa Billowitz of Brown
Against Sexual Assault and Harassment calls the list ''an act of desperation in
an attempt to get Brown to act responsibly and provide us with a system where
we can air these grievances publicly as opposed to bathroom walls.''

Well
if that is true, then she got the first half of it right. The second half was
to condemn the idea of publicly branding 30 male students as rapists without
anyone knowing whether they were innocent or guilty. But that’s not something
she does. If anything, she makes rationalizations for it.

Anotherarticle in the Baltimore Sun asks, Are
nearly all male students at the University of Maryland "potential
rapists"? Women in a feminist art class
here apparently believe so. About 10 of them plastered the campus with fliers
last week listing the names of virtually every male student under the heading,
"NOTICE: THESE MEN ARE POTENTIAL RAPISTS." Their decision to walk
the murky line between libel and free speech sent the campus into an uproar.
Yesterday, reporters, photographers and TV crews flocked to the sprawling
campus in search of outraged students on both sides of the issue. University officials are
trying to determine whether some members of the "Current Issues in
Feminist Art" class or their teacher violated their codes of conduct, said
Roland H. King, the university's spokesman.

The project began as a
response to several sexual assaults on campus in the past year. To alert women
to the pervasiveness of rape, the art students prepared fliers with names
culled from the campus directory. Everyone with an
identifiably male name, such as Tom or Mohammed or John, ended up on an
alphabetized list. The women also set up large posters containing all of the
names on the grassy mall at the center of the campus, where masked women put on
an anti-rape play. They call themselves the Women's Coalition for Change but
have not revealed their names.

Mr. King said it is
unclear whether teacher Josephine Withers was involved in the project, which
was not listed on her outline for the course. She did not return phone calls
yesterday. The school administration
considers the display "inappropriate" and an error in judgment, Mr.
King said, but the case also raises thorny issues about free speech. "It certainly
touches on key First Amendment issues that colleges face all the time, which is
the balancing of individual rights with the right of free speech," he
said. "One of the things
that defines a college or university is that it's a forum where, more than in
society at large, you can debate ideas. To do that, you have to include the
people at the fringes as well as people at the center." When the students
attached names to their display, he said, they moved into a "very gray
area."

Sophomore Matthew Nowlin,
20, an aerospace engineering student, briefly considered suing when he found
his name on the "potential rapists" list, fearing that his character
had been impugned. It didn't take long for
him to feel the ramifications of being included on the list. A woman who walked
past him later that day looked at him with "fear in her eyes," he
said. Now, he just wants an
apology from the lists' authors. Yesterday, Mr. Nowlin helped organize a small
rally on campus to talk about sexual assault. "I want to turn away from
the anger this has caused and turn us back to the issue of violence on
campus," he said. The anger, however, is the point, said several women who
strongly supported the display but said they were not involved in it.

Erin Lane, 22, a senior
economics major, and several of her friends discussed the project outside the
Food Co-op in the student center. "A lot of people are very upset by it,
but I think if a man was secure he wasn't a rapist, he wouldn't be threatened
by this list," Ms. Lane said. "I think it's admirable that men in
this school have been saying the word 'rape' and are being angry at the same
time," said Jessica True, 23, a freshman from Takoma Park. "We're
forced to accept the fact we're potential rape victims everyday," said
Kelly Maron, 20, a sophomore from La Plata studying art and women's studies.

Question:
what if a bunch of guys got together on campus and posted fliers around the
university saying, “NOTICE: These women are potential rape liars,” and listed
the names of many female students on campus they never met and knew nothing
about. What if a female student who saw her name publicly put on such a list
actually was a victim of rape? How would she feel? I would imagine that she
would probably feel devastated at the lack of humanity.

And
also, what do they mean by “potential”? I have seen these actions defended by
those say that such statements are justified because, theoretically, everyone
can perform the motor functions of the act of rape. Well, first of all, that’s
factually incorrect, because it’s including the disabled and the handicapped
among them. But beyond that, the word “potential” has different meanings. There
is the potential of one’s body, but there is also the potential of one’s
character; their strength of will and conscience. And call me crazy, but when
it comes to rape, I don’t think everyone has it in them. And I think it’s
bordering on sexism, if not the essence of sexism, to say that everyone does,
so long as that “everyone” is all men.

But
beyond that, it bears mention that the word potential doesn’t just mean
“possible.” Let’s go to Thesaurus.com and search for synonyms. And guys, as I’m
going through each of these, imagine that each synonym is immediately followed
by “rapist” immediately followed by your name.

Words
that mean the same as potential: abeyant, budding, conceivable, dormant,
embryonic, future,
hidden,
imaginable, implied,
inherent,
latent,
likely,
lurking, plausible, possible,
prepatent, probable,
quiescent,
thinkable, undeveloped, unrealized, within realm of possibility.Language, as
we all know, is not finite or fixed; it is, as they say, socially constructed. It can be read many
different ways, and they know this. Indeed, since many of these Feminists likely study the postmodernist
philosophies of deconstruction in the humanities (and in Women’s Studies in
particular), they should know this better than anyone. When Feminists seek to raise our consciousness on the nature of sexual
harassment and hostile environments, they often tell us that it does not matter
how the message is intended; it only matters how it is received. And since they
know that many will perceive the word “potential” not just to mean that it is
possible for those they name to rape, but that it is likely for them to do so (a message which is reinforced by the big
word “NOTICE” right in front of their name), they should certainly know better.

And
we have to ask: how does this really help victims of sexual assault? It
doesn’t. It doesn’t help anyone.

Earlier this year at
Oberlin College, a group calling itself “Take Back the Night” posted signs
across campus identifying a freshman as “Rapist of the Month.” The freshman, an
18-year-old studying philosophy, recalls the day the signs went up. He was getting his mail
when he noticed students crowded in front of a bulletin board. They were
reading a sign – a sign calling him a rapist. “My initial reaction was complete
shock, complete disbelief,” says the freshman, who requested his name not be
published. “My friends gathered around and said, ‘Hey, what’s this all about?’”
He tore the sign down, along with several others on campus. The next few days were
spent denying the accusation – to fiends, acquaintances, and the media. “I
haven’t even dated at Oberlin,” he says. ‘I don’t drink. I don’t do drugs. I
couldn’t have gotten myself in that kind of situation.’ Adds friend Stacy
Tolchin: ‘"He’s probably almost boring."

Campus officials
investigated but failed to find who posted the signs. The rumor is that it was
a case of mistaken identity: the signs had the right first name but not the
last. Many students at the small liberal arts school south of Cleveland say the
signs went too far. ‘They tried and convicted him right there,’ freshman Ryan
Maltese says. ‘For the rest of his time here, whenever he approaches a woman in
any kind of romantic atmosphere, it’s going to be in her mind: ‘Did this guy
rape someone?’’

Such tactics are not
surprising, says junior Ted Chapman, sitting in the courtyard outside the
Student Union. He says tensions have been so high the last couple of years that
he has virtually quit dating. Friend Dave Roscky nods in agreement. Nearby, sophomore
Emily Lloyd says men are missing the point. “So many women get their lives
totally ruined by being assaulted and not saying anything. So if one guy gets
his life ruined, maybe it balances out.” The man next to her, a long-haired
freshman in glasses, disagrees. ‘All I can think is what would I do if my name
was up there on that sign?’ he says. ‘What would I do?’ Ms. Lloyd shoots back:
‘Do you know what you’d do if you were raped?’ There is a tense silence as the
freshman studies the grass in front of him. Finally, he looks up. "Well, I know
one thing," he says, "I wouldn’t put up a sign."

“It
balances out?” Here we have another woman who, just like Assistant Dean of
Students Catherine Comins, believes that it does not matter if men have their
lives ruined by false accusations of rape. It’s all justified – and why?
Because some women are victims of rape. It should go without saying that both
victims of rape and victims of false accusations of rape deserve our compassion
and support. But this is not what this woman, nor what this particular group
calling itself “Take Back the Night” believes.

“Steps
to Preventing Rape. #1: Men should keep to well-lit areas. #2: Men should wear
bells around their necks at all times. #3: Men should be accompanied by
protection officers. #4: Men should refrain from putting drugs in women’s
drinks. #5: Men should avoid attacking women.” And lastly, in all caps: “REAL
MEN DON’T RAPE.”

Why do people do bad
things? Usually, because they can. Those who posted this thought that the
academic environment was such that messages of denigrating men would be
tolerated. And they were right. For how many years exactly was this poster up?
We don’t know. But too many. And let’s stop and think for second: if we were to live in a world where people who believe, say
and do things like these were completely unopposed, what kind of world would
that be? Is that a world we would want to live in? I hope we all see what is
going on here: male students are being publicly insulted, humiliated, and
ostracized, and they are told that they deserve it based upon their genetic
code. And again, we have to ask: how does this message help victims of sexual
assault? How does this help anyone? And if it’s not about helping victims of
sexual assault, we are well within our rights to ask: what is it about?

On
the other side of Canada, at Simon Frasier University, the Women’s Center hosts
what they call the Male Allies project. On
their website it says, “Though still in its conceptual form, the male allies
project is the brainchild of the women’s centre designed to bring
self-identified men together to talk about masculinity and its harmful effects
on both men and women. We know that many men are concerned with the way
masculinity denigrates women by making them into sexual objects, is homophobic,
encourages violence, and discourages emotional expression. It is the hope of
the women’s centre that the male allies project will help men address these
concerns in conjunction with other men and allow them an opportunity to
reimagine what masculinity could be.”

I
wonder, what would it be like if we were to replace the “male and female” with “white
and black”? What would that sound like? “The black allies project is the
brainchild of the White People’s Centre designed to bring self-identified
blacks together to talk about the social construct of blackness and its harmful
effects on both whites and blacks. We know that many blacks are concerned with
the way blackness encourages gang violence, the rape of white women, promotes
drug use, theft, and general thuggery. It is the hope of the White People’s
Center that the Black Allies project will help blacks address these concerns in
conjunction with other blacks and allow them to reimagine what blackness could
be.”

Where
and when would you imagine a promotion of such a perspective taking place? Maybe
in the South during the era of Jim Crow? Moving on.

At
Princeton university, a female student who was an alleged victim of an earlier rape
and a sex-assault victim advocate falsely accused a man of rape at a Take Back
the Night rally, and her friends started a gossip campaign against the man she
accused. But after he accusation became public and a formal investigation of
her complaint turned up nothing, she printed a retraction in the campusnewspaper The Daily Princetonian,which is available online. I think it deserves to be quoted at length:

I wish to make the community aware that some of the statements I have
made recently on the editorial page of The Daily Princetonian and at the Take
Back the Night march have been incorrect. I believe it is absolutely essential
that I clarify my story so that no unfair accusations continue to be made by
myself or others against any of my fellow classmates or other members of the
university community. Despite my comments to the contrary, I never brought any
official charges of sexual harassment or assault against any Princeton student.
Consequently, no student has ever been dismissed or suspended from Princeton
University as a result of a sexual harassment or assault offense committed
against me.

I never intended for anyone to be hurt by my statements and I
wholeheartedly apologize to anyone who either took offense or felt as if they
were personally injured by my letter and speech. Rather than attempting to
achieve any type of revenge toward my alleged assailant, I made my statements
in The Daily Princetonian and at the Take Back the Night march in order to
raise awareness for the plight of the campus rape victims. Although I want
sympathy and support for my fellow victims, I do not want to create an
uncomfortable academic or social environment for any other Princeton University
student. Because of these comments, a certain individual has been wrongly
accused and is being pursued for a crime he did not commit. Although I have
never met this individual or spoken to him, I would like to utilize this public
forum to specifically apologize to him. In fact, the student I identified as my
assailant in conversation with many members of this community was not the
person who raped me. He coincidentally left Princeton on his own accord around
the time I was raped but his leaving the university for personal reasons and my
rape are completely unrelated.

I urge students who are knowledgeable of this
situation to cease blaming this person for my attack. In several personal
conversations and especially at the Take Back The Night march, I have been
overcome with emotion. As a result, I was not as coherent or accurate in my
recounting of events as a situation as delicate as this demands. I hope this
letter definitively clarifies all questionable aspects of my story. Two years
ago I made the decision not to prosecute the true assailant. Now I do not have
the right to make unfounded statements about others. Therefore, I once again
apologize to any individuals who have been personally injured or verbally
attacked as a result of my statements. This statement is one I have chosen to
make voluntarily. Thank you for listening.

Well,
we do have to give her some credit for coming clean. At the same time, not only
has she done incredible harm to an innocent male student by making a false
accusation, she has done harm to victims of sexual assault.

There
is something that needs to be said about gatherings and demonstrations by
activist groups in general that applies in these cases. And that is whenever
you immerse yourself within a peer group many of whom dogmatically believe every
claim of victimization by a member of that group, and who you know will accept
unquestioningly anything you say, so long as you claim to be a victim, there is
a temptation among the less stable to get swept in the moment and just start
saying anything that comes to mind. But you have to make sure that if you point
the finger at someone in the middle of a frenzied mob of people, and accuse
them of a crime (especially a crime of violence), once you point the finger at
someone, there’s no going back from that point. She herself says that she got
swept up in it, saying, that she was “overcome with emotion” in “several personal
conversations and especially at the Take Back The Night march,” which
interfered with her ability to make sound judgments.

Which
leads us to a problematic mentality that is an undercurrent among some of these
advocates, and the Boston rape crisis center (which supports the Clothesline
Project, another anti-rape demonstration) just comes right out and saysit better than I ever could, saying “The Clothesline Project is there to
provoke a reaction - but the thing about emotional reactions to traumatic
events is that there’s no wrong reaction.”

Assuming that this center
is speaking literally – and there’s no reason to assume otherwise - if someone is falsely accused of rape and they lose their
jobs, their friends, or their marriages, would this rape crisis center support
the idea that it gives them the right harass and intimidate every woman that
claims to be a rape victim? No wrong reaction whatsoever? Tell that to the young man at Princeton who was pursued,
ostracized, and persecuted because he was falsely accused of rape by someone
who was “overcome with emotion” at Take Back the Night rallies that there is no
wrong reaction. Tell that to the rape victims at that university who will now have
a harder time being believed because of it.

There
is an attitude among some that so long as they are victims of a traumatic
event, or not even that – so long as they adopt the label of victim (no proof
required) - they immediately shed all of their adult responsibilities, and no
matter how much harm they cause to innocent people – whether men or women – they
think it’s all ok. But it’s not ok. And with that being said, let’s talk about
the Clothesline Project in our next video, where we’ll discuss more rape
hysteria by students, before moving on to faculty and administrators.